Marcus Camby

HORNETS: The injury-riddled franchise signed free agent guard Devin Brown, looking for more depth at shooting guard and small forward. Brown has also played with Denver, San Antonio and Utah. He was a member of San Antonio's NBA championship team in 2005. NUGGETS: Marcus Camby expects to be sidelined a couple of weeks after breaking a finger on his shooting hand. His absence is a blow to a team already without suspended players Carmelo Anthony and J.R. Smith. SUPERSONICS: Rashard Lewis, the team's second-leading scorer, is expected to miss at least two months because of a torn hand tendon.

July 20, 2013 Q: Despite limited cap space (none), the Heat have done one thing consistently in each Big 3-era offseason, added one rotation player (Mike Miller, Shane Battier, Ray Allen). I believe they must do this once again. -- Jose. A: But Pat Riley might contend the Heat already have done that, by re-upping with Chris Andersen, who arrived at midseason and only now is entering his first full season with the team. With Chris Bosh, Birdman, LeBron James, Dwyane Wade, Mario Chalmers, Allen, Battier and Norris Cole, there simply might not be a "rotation" spot available this summer, and that's not even factoring Udonis Haslem into the equation.

If there was going to be a snow-filled pothole along the road to an undefeated regular season for the University of Massachusetts, this was going to be the time and place. Virginia Tech had been waiting for Saturday afternoon since it decided to move to the Atlantic 10 this season from the Metro Conference. The storm had forced the UMass itinerary to Plan B, a detour to Greensboro, N.C., late Thursday that disrupted the Minutemen's plans. A hostile crowd, a 10th-ranked opponent, a stressful trip.

Chris Bosh made sure to correctly answer the question. He recently was asked what it was like being a teenager the first time he watched Tim Duncan play in the NBA. Bosh, the Miami Heat center, remembered it differently. He had yet to reach his teenage years. "Not to make him feel old, I might not have been a teenager," Bosh said. "I might have been a preteen. " When the Heat play the San Antonio Spurs and the 36-year-old Duncan Thursday, it will mark yet another vintage yet still effective player they will face.

The real Knicks stepped forward last season. Twice. And that is the conundrum when considering the future. With a mere two weeks to play in the regular season, New York was facing a trip to the lottery, coach Jeff Van Gundy was looking at almost certain termination, and Marcus Camby was about to be run out of town for being too soft and Latrell Sprewell for being too cocky. And then, in a New York minute, everything changed. A playoff prayer from Allan Houston was answered in the closing seconds of the first round against the Heat.

COLLEGE BASKETBALL Former University of Massachusetts basketball star Marcus Camby secretly met with a university committee last week and admitted he took money and gifts from professional agents last season, sources told the Boston Globe on Wednesday. Camby made the admissions during several hours of questioning by committee members at the Springfield Chamber of Commerce July 24, the sources said. Camby's agent, James Sears Bryant of ProServ Inc., confirmed that the interview took place and said his client "told them everything he knew."

"You can't get mad at the games now; you can only get mad at the effort." -- Blazers forward Darius Miles, on Portland's decision to devote the balance of its season to the development of its younger players. "I'm kind of used to one person dribbling around with the ball all the time. It just feels really good to be here and get back to playing basketball and getting easy baskets." -- Forward Kenny Thomas, on going from Allen Iverson's 76ers to the pass-happy Kings. "There are a lot of reasons, which I don't have time to go into detail."

There was simply too much Marcus Camby for Florida to handle in Sunday's championship game of the Franklin National Bank Classic. Camby, a junior center for Massachusetts, scored a game-high 30 points in 25 minutes to lead the No. 5 Minutemen past the Gators 80-58 before a crowd of 16,358 at USAir Arena. Camby, who was named the Most Valuable Player of the two-day tournament, scored in a variety of ways: from a baby-soft, 15-foot jumper in the lane to power moves underneath with Florida center Dametri Hill draped all over him. Camby added eight rebounds and made 12 of 16 free throws.

Want to know about the most intriguing matchup in the NBA Finals? Ask John Calipari. Surely the former New Jersey Nets and University of Massachusetts coach won't be a casual observer when the New York Knicks meet the San Antonio Spurs. Not when you consider that he coached budding Knicks star Marcus Camby in college and helped him prepare to face then-Wake Forest star Tim Duncan in a Dec. 5, 1995, game that was one of the most eagerly anticipated big-man matchups in college basketball history.

The Knicks went to the free-throw line 42 times in Game 2, nine more trips than the Heat, but that didn't stop coach Jeff Van Gundy from wondering about the officiating on the eve of Game 3. "Those new rules have gone out the window," Van Gundy said Thursday. "There's not many perimeter fouls on the dribble right now. I don't think that will change by being home." Van Gundy said he wasn't complaining. "The refereeing has been no factor. I'm not saying that at all. It's [just] gone back to how it's been in the past."

HORNETS: The injury-riddled franchise signed free agent guard Devin Brown, looking for more depth at shooting guard and small forward. Brown has also played with Denver, San Antonio and Utah. He was a member of San Antonio's NBA championship team in 2005. NUGGETS: Marcus Camby expects to be sidelined a couple of weeks after breaking a finger on his shooting hand. His absence is a blow to a team already without suspended players Carmelo Anthony and J.R. Smith. SUPERSONICS: Rashard Lewis, the team's second-leading scorer, is expected to miss at least two months because of a torn hand tendon.

"You can't get mad at the games now; you can only get mad at the effort." -- Blazers forward Darius Miles, on Portland's decision to devote the balance of its season to the development of its younger players. "I'm kind of used to one person dribbling around with the ball all the time. It just feels really good to be here and get back to playing basketball and getting easy baskets." -- Forward Kenny Thomas, on going from Allen Iverson's 76ers to the pass-happy Kings. "There are a lot of reasons, which I don't have time to go into detail."

Center Luc Longley retires. The Knicks get a salary-cap exception that comes fully equipped with a ticking clock. The exception expires before New York can do anything with it. Power forward Larry Johnson retires. The Knicks think they will get another salary-cap exception. New York is wrong, as the league explains the timing of Johnson's decision precludes such a possibility. Marcus Camby comes down with the dreaded plantar fasciaitis, the foot ailment that last season left Glen Rice with all the mobility of Fred Sanford.

Shooting guard Eddie Jones joked that sleeping in the same bed with his 4-year-old daughter Chelsie brought him more physical contact than the Heat's practice before today's nationally televised game against the Knicks. Jones surprisingly found himself complaining that nobody "banged" him up during Saturday's workout. The physicality was something the team's leading scorer sought, even though it was supposed to be his first full practice after sitting out a month with a dislocated left shoulder.

The New York Knicks have offered Marcus Camby, arguably their most energetic, crowd-pleasing player, and Glen Rice, their most accurate 3-point shooter, to the Atlanta Hawks for Dikembe Mutombo, three Eastern Conference officials said on Tuesday. Atlanta has no interest in Rice, so the clubs have tried to involve the Vancouver Grizzlies to sweeten the deal for the Hawks. The three-team deal would send Camby and Rice to Vancouver while Atlanta would receive Grizzlies forward Shareef Abdur-Rahim, a native of nearby Marietta, Ga., whom they have long coveted.

To say this hasn't been a good season for Glen Rice would be an understatement. First, Rice found himself exiled from the Los Angeles Lakers after winning the championship last summer. Rice thought he found a home with the Knicks, but was ultimately pushed out of the starting lineup by Allan Houston and Latrell Sprewell, who are having All-Star seasons. As if that wasn't enough, Rice finds himself presently bothered by plantar fasciaitis on his left foot, a nagging injury that limits mobility until a tendon on the bottom of the foot tears, requiring season ending surgery.

- New York Knicks point guard Charlie Ward had a first quarter to remember on Wednesday. With Chris Childs hobbled by a sprained left knee, Ward gave the Knicks the type of production from the point that they haven't been used to seeing. Ward scored 10 points, including two 3-pointers, and made two key steals to help the Knicks rally from an early seven-point deficit. Ward helped the Knicks regain the lead by using a few moves from his quarterback days at Florida State, where he won the Heisman Trophy in 1993.

To say this hasn't been a good season for Glen Rice would be an understatement. First, Rice found himself exiled from the Los Angeles Lakers after winning the championship last summer. Rice thought he found a home with the Knicks, but was ultimately pushed out of the starting lineup by Allan Houston and Latrell Sprewell, who are having All-Star seasons. As if that wasn't enough, Rice finds himself presently bothered by plantar fasciaitis on his left foot, a nagging injury that limits mobility until a tendon on the bottom of the foot tears, requiring season ending surgery.

Rivalry or not a rivalry? That was the debate Tuesday as the Heat and Knicks stood on the eve of the resumption of their head-to-head series. To the NBA, it still is special. The teams meet five times, more than against any other opponent. To network television, it still is meaningful. All five games will receive national coverage, starting tonight on TNT from Madison Square Garden. Yet Patrick Ewing has been traded from the Knicks and Heat center Alonzo Mourning is out for the season with a kidney ailment.

After a mostly harmonious season, the brink of elimination put the Knicks on edge. Discord flared up during the Game 5 loss in Miami, when Chris Childs and Patrick Ewing yelled at each other on the court. Childs signaled Ewing to set a pick. Ewing wanted the ball. "Just a miscommunication," Childs said before Game 6 at Madison Square Garden on Friday. "A miscommunication on both our parts. We got it straightened out. Everyone wants to win. The bottom line is we didn't play well as a team.